


Red Light, Yellow Light

by Kermode



Series: Life's Not A Game [2]
Category: Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: Angst, Character Death, Depression, F/M, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Minor Character Death, Sabrina is dead, Slow Burn, chlonath, mental health
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-10-11
Updated: 2018-10-11
Packaged: 2019-07-29 11:43:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,178
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16263515
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kermode/pseuds/Kermode
Summary: Chloe is forced to wear the perfect smile when all she wants to do is cry. She plays pretend for the public, but in her room she drowns in her own tears. She simply can't move forward if the world keeps watching her. This story accompanies Blind Cat's Bluff (which follows Adrien) but both can be read as a stand alone piece.





	Red Light, Yellow Light

**Author's Note:**

> This is a part of Blind Cat's Bluff that I've been wanting to do for a long time now.  
> As always, I make no apologies for the heartbreak you may experience.

Chloe stared at her reflection. It didn't look like her. The young woman in the mirror was gaunt and tired, skin hallowed from too many nightmares and too many forced smiles. She began to plaster on her makeup just to feel normal again. A steady, practiced hand made easy work of the task. 

“That's way too much concealer, it's got to be!” She bemoaned to the mirror, inspecting the bags beneath her eyes, still dark despite the heavy makeup. She went back for more despite her words and found the container was nearly empty. It went careening across the room as the woman screamed.

“Urgh! Why today!?” 

Chloe dragged at her hair rougher than usual as she brushed it up into a tight ponytail. The pain gave her something to focus on, something to anchor herself to as she stared into her own lifeless eyes. Her gaze flittered down to the image stuck to the glass. Sabrina’s bright smile beamed up at her. The moment she finished grooming, she fled the mirror. 

Black. Chloe stared into the wardrobe the size of a small bedroom and tried to find something, _anything,_ black. A pair of designer jeans, maybe. Not the grubby old pullover sweater she used for paintball last year. Why hadn't she gotten rid of that yet?

Chloe pulled the top out and as her fingers rubbed against the paint splatters, memories flooded back. An end of year school trip. Ivan protecting Mylene with all his might, covered head to toe in colour when his girlfriend didn't have a drop on her. Marinette running circles around her other classmates. Adrien could still see then, and he had laughed like Chloe had never heard before upon seeing her complain about the paint in her hair. Sabrina had taken off her sweater and and used it to clean Chloe’s face. 

_I never thanked her for that._

She carefully put the garment back in place.

“I'll wear it when Daddy won't see,” she promised aloud to the spirit she still wasn't sure if she believed in. “You know, I'd be way more inclined to believe you're there if you actually gave me a sign or something.” 

Chloe sighed when nothing happened, disappointed but unsurprised. She returned to finding an outfit. She settled on a black shirt not covered in paint, but rather rhinestones around the off the shoulder collar. Cool for the spring day, glamorous, yet practical for the dreary occasion. She even chose a dark pair of sunglasses. 

Back at the mirror, Chloè silently judged her appearance. She opted to keep the glasses down. No one could tell her not to, especially today. 

_____

 

“Sabrina was a loving young lady…”

“Sabrina was charming, and growing into such a wonderful woman…” 

“Sabrina was a beautiful girl taken from us far too soon…

“...far too early…”

“...much too young…” 

“...so much to live for, and we will live on with her memory…”

“...with her inside our hearts.”

“...with her always in our thoughts.”

“...we will never forget Sabrina.”

“Bullshit,” Chloe whispered to herself, the curse going unnoticed. “None of you knew her. Not like I did…” 

But person after person spoke at the public memorial service, all with tales to tell and anecdotes that made people chuckle weakly around sobs. Chloe didn't know when she was meant to laugh though. The stories made her lips twitch but never once could she bring herself to find fondness in another person's version of Sabrina. They all seemed fake and perfect and false. 

“Sabrina was a total dork,” Chloe started strong when she finally made her way to the front. “Her clothes never matched, she had glasses that were so old fashioned they weren't even hipster.” 

Her throat caught as she searched the silent audience for those horn rimmed glasses. “But… even with me as a best friend, she… she…” 

There was movement in the crowd, quiet and pitiful whispers. 

“Sabrina owned it, like she owned her life. She didn't take my…” 

Chloe’s gaze danced up to her father in the audience, watching expectantly and with more than a small frown. She swallowed down the tears that built. She looked out further, seeing Adrien just a few rows behind. He seemed to sense her gaze and offered a tiny smile. It helped.  
“Sabrina stood up to me like no one else ever would. She was brave and loyal, way too loyal. Way too naïve too, but she owned that as well.” 

Chloe laughed to herself then, a distant memory of explaining dirty innuendos to her friend. Sabrina never caught on to them quickly. Chloe turned her eyes to her feet for a long moment. 

“I'm never going to have a best friend like her, and I'm starting to realise that. Sabrina…” 

She turned to the large photograph of her departed friend, raising a hand toward it wistfully, as if maybe the gesture alone could bring her back. “I didn't deserve you. None of us did. You were always an angel amongst us.”

Chloe returned to her seat then, kicking herself internally. She'd fucked up the script. Hell, she hadn't even read the script her father had put in her hands that morning! He wasn't going to be happy, especially with the cameras at the back of the hall. 

Her nails dug deep into her palms, the pain stopped her from crying aloud. She hardly focused on the rest of the service, and only noticed the end when everyone around her rose and bowed their heads in silence. Chloe followed suit and slipped her sunglasses over her eyes. 

The silence was strange. Sabrina had never liked silence, she would always talk a mile an hour when things began to get quiet. It had bothered Chloe to start with, until she knew why. The tense silences between the Raincomprix family before the divorce ached far more than any screaming did. 

A stranger’s hand found her shoulder, breaking the blonde from her thoughts. 

“Sympathies, my dear,” the woman said and Chloe felt forced to smile in thanks. Another person came as soon as she left, offering condolences. Then another, and another, like she was Sabrina’s sister and not just her friend. Each offered seemingly heartfelt wishes but Chloe only felt empty. They gathered around her like moths to a flame. 

“Thank you,” Chloe repeated as each new voice spoke, and she pushed past them too, only to be faced with a swarm of more kind people. 

“Can I please… excuse me… yes, thank you… thank you… please move,” Chloe kept saying as she side stepped around each person that closed in. She knew they only meant well, but she didn't need people right now. She needed space, perhaps a drink of something hard. 

“We all miss her.” 

“You two were such great friends.”

“Condolences, miss.” 

“You're in my prayers.”

“I'm sure she's watching over us all.”

“MOVE! LEAVE ME ALONE!” 

Chloe didn't know it was her own voice until everyone's kindness turned to disapproving glares. Whispers circulated through the crowd and Chloe dashed away as the closest ones met her ears.

“Little brat.”

“We're all grieving, this isn't about her.”

“Another tantrum? Really?” 

Chloe passed her father on the way. He made a grab for her arm but she couldn't allow him to see the tears running down her cheeks. She pulled away and kept walking until she was alone. Somehow she'd made her way down the back of the building, and there she fell against the bricks. 

In some pure stroke of irony, the day had been the warmest so far. Summer sunlight threatened her skin, broken by the trees and shadows of homes overhead. She didn't care. Chloe finally let the tears cascade down her face freely. She ripped her sunglasses off so her balled up hands could rub at her eyes. Angry cries tore at her throat as she fell to the ground. 

“No, Nino,” a voice from a far off distance made its way into her clouded mind. “I should talk to her alone.” 

“Okay, dude,” was another voice, then the crunching of feet on gravel. Designer shoes peeked into her view.

“Hey, Chlo,” Adrien said softly as he stopped by her form. He crouched down beside her before sitting. Chloe sniffed back the last of the tears. 

“Hey,” she whispered with a broken voice. A moment passed between them and Adrien wrapped an arm about her. 

The silence with Adrien was different to the silence with strangers. His was warmer, more comforting than all of the kind words. She felt more at home right then than she had since Sabrina had died. 

“Are you okay?” Adrien asked as a cool breeze wafted through their hiding place. Chloe let her face fall into his chest. 

“I'm… no,” she replied in a fractured whisper. She cringed at how pathetic she sounded. “No, I'm not, Adriek- Dri. I'm meant to be strong and get over it, but people keep talking to me, and I just want them to leave me alone! Why won't random people leave me alone?”

“Because it's human to feel sympathy,” Adrien offered. “And it's normal for people to say they're sorry when someone dies.” 

“But why? They have no reason to be sorry! I'm the…. I'm the one that took her shopping, Dri… it's my fault.”

“No, no it's not, Chlo,” Adrien quickly said and bundled the woman up in a tighter hug. She didn't protest. “No one could have known what was going to happen, okay? It's not your fault. None of this is.”

“It feels like it,” Chloe murmured as she slipped her own arms around Adrien's waist. She let his shirt soak up her tears. Adrien pressed his face into the crown of her hair.

“It's not,” he promised again. “And you don't have to pretend to be strong. No one ever expects someone to be strong after losing a loved one.” 

Silence fell again and Chloe listened to the gentle beat of Adrien's heart. Tears began to form again and she let them come. Soon she was choking on sobs and Adrien comforted her. If he hadn't had cat like hearing, he might never have heard Chloe's whispered confession.

“Daddy does.”

_____

 

The silence bothered her the most. Maybe because Sabrina had always filled it. Maybe because without Sabrina, her room in the hotel was just an empty chamber of echoes. Maybe because it offered Chloe time to think and she didn't want to think. 

Chloe turned on the radio first, permanently tuned to her favourite station. But the celebrity gossip and pop songs about sex did nothing to quell the murmurs in her mind. As she dashed memories away, others overtook and she was lost again in the swirling abyss of Sabrina. 

Chloe lost hours to her thoughts. She lost sleep to the fear of nightmares. She didn't eat that night; it wasn't the first time. 

It was in the very early hours of the morning when she rolled over on the bed and sought out her phone. She flicked through her contacts eyeing each one in thought.

Adrien would be asleep. Not her. Not him. No way. When had she added Marc? Marinette would never want to talk to her. No. Never! Nathanael… would he still be awake? The app said he was still online… 

It took her far too long to start the conversation. 

_-Hey Kurtzberg._

She really didn't expect Nathanael to reply, especially not as quickly as he did. 

_-Hey chloe what's up_

What was up? Chloe’s fingers hesitated over the phone as she struggled to make sense of why she'd chosen to even message him. Maybe she didn't need sense. Maybe she just needed someone. 

_-What were the songs we were listening to?_

Several long minutes passed as Chloe watched the screen intently. She could see him typing. What was taking so long?!

Then the message arrived. There were nearly a dozen songs, all ordered with links and details provided. Chloe clicked the first and went back to messaging Nathanael as music filled her room.

_-I swear we only listened to four, Kurtzberg._

_-We did. That's the first 4. The others I thought ya might like_

_-I don't even like this kind of music._

_-Then why'd ya ask for it_

Why had she? Because they seemed to understand how she felt. They knew without ever meeting her, just what she was going through. The emotions were there, screamed into a microphone from another country. But played in her room, it felt like they were singing into her soul.

_-Do they ever make you cry?_

_-Sometimes yeah. When life is shit I'd rather listen to a song than maybe do something I regret_

_-Like what?_

Again, Nathanael took some time to reply. Chloe expected another long reply. 

_-Sometimes songs make ya realise that emotions are ok. Pain doesn't gotta be a factor. So yeah. Crying is the better option_

Oh. 

_-... Pain keeps me focused._

_-Be careful k? Pain can get addictive. Songs are better_

_-Can you send me more?_

_-I'll make ya a playlist_

**Author's Note:**

> Please let me know what you think! Your comments and feedback fuel more content.


End file.
